Dungeon Core Academy: Books 1-7 (A LitRPG Series) by Alex Oakchest (book suggestions txt) 📕

“Let’s see. We need a riddle for you. Ah. It walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs in the evening.”

“What?” said Shadow, inexplicably alarmed. “What manner of creature walks on two legs when the sun rises, yet has three legs at sunset? Tell me, core!”

“It’s a riddle, Shadow. You don’t take it literally.”

“A riddle?”

“Yeah, a riddle. A question or statement phrased as to require ingenuity to get its meaning.”

“I don’t care for riddles, Core. I prefer plain speech. What is this two, four, three-legged creature?”

I looked at the riddle door. “Well?”

The bullhead snorted. “This door doesn’t know and doesn’t care, wishes you’d walk down there.”

“Stupid damn riddle doors,” I said. “The answer is man.”

“Man?” said Shadow, growing so confused that she was actually angry.

“Four legs in the morning, means when he is a baby and he is crawling. Two legs at noon, when he walks normally. Three legs in the evening means his old age, where some people must use a cane to walk.”

“Pah. This is silver-tongue speak. No kobold would enjoy such a tricky way of talking.”

“Well, that’s the riddle we’ll use. It’s a little too easy at present if this plan is going to work. I need a riddle that the goblins can’t guess.”

This was the problem.

See, here was my plan. I was going to place a riddle door here, and one at the opposite end of the tunnel. If the riddles were tough enough, the goblins wouldn’t guess them, and the doors wouldn’t open. They’d be trapped in the tunnel.

Why don’t they just bust the riddle door open? That’s what some of you might be thinking, given there was a goblin with a warhammer not far away.

There’s something about riddle door construction that stops this. Essence is woven into the wood or iron, reinforcing them at their innermost level. Only an incredibly high-level hero would force a riddle door open.

This meant that either they died of starvation or thirst trapped in the tunnel, or I killed them by some other means. Hopefully, the riddle doors would hold.

But there was a problem; I had to play fair. A riddle door would only work if you gave it a riddle that was logical and solvable. Otherwise, I could keep it shut by making up a nonsensical word that the goblins couldn’t even imagine.

So, there needed to be a riddle and a logical answer. You know, the kind that made you go ah yes! once you heard it.

However….

This was where I would rub my hands together if I had hands that anyone could see.

“Shadow,” I said. “Can you translate the riddle into kobold please?”

“Excuse me, Core Beno?”

“The riddle I told you, and its answer. I’d like you to translate it into the kobold language in just a second.” I spoke to the bullhead now. “Riddle door, here is your riddle. Go ahead, shadow.”

Shadow spoke the riddle to the door. To me, her words sounded normal because I was able to understand the languages of all creatures made in my dungeon.

To the goblins, though, and to their hero slaves…let’s just say I would be surprised if any among them spoke Kobold.

See, the riddle door rules say that I have to give a riddle door a logical riddle and a logical answer. They say nothing about what language it should be in.

Feeling more optimistic, I had Shadow carry me along the tunnel parallel to the Seekers, and then we headed east a few paces until we reached the tunnel opening the Seekers would emerge from when they walked the length of the passageway.

Here, I placed a second riddle door, this one with a cockatiel’s head for a knocker, and had Shadow give it a riddle in Kobold.

With that done, I was 220 essence points poorer, leaving me with just 85. But, the Seekers were trapped. It would be ten minutes before they realized it, but they were trapped.

“Let’s head back to the core room,” I told Shadow. “Thanks for your help, scoutmaster.”

“Scoutmaster?” she said.

“Yes. I will need to create more scouts in the coming days, and they need a leader.”

“Well…thank you, Core Beno. It is an honor.”

CHAPTER 12

Goblins and people take a long time to die, especially when you have to listen to them do it. The phrase a watched cauldron never bubbles never seemed so apt.

This might sound callous if you’re not accustomed to mass slaughter, but it isn’t quite so bad. Honestly, it isn’t.

Anyone who goes into a dungeon knows the risk they are taking, and every dungeon dweller has a right to defend their home. Especially when their own second life is at stake. If Jahn or I failed, we’d both be ground to core dust by First-Leaf Godwin, and the Wrotun people would be in trouble.

 One thing you learn as a core is that life runs in cycles, and life and death are two meeting points. One cannot exist without the other. Take one away, and the circle becomes misshapen.

This was what the Wrotun were doing, in a way. They had taken the death part of the circle and used the mana spring to wrench it free, pulling it further and further away so that their circle of life and death probably looked more like an egg.

For a while, I listened to the Seekers discussing the riddle with one another. As I suspected, none of them spoke Kobold. Riddles are annoying at the best of times, but ones written in another language?

After they realized they wouldn’t open the door that way, they resorted to force. Their bard played a song on his tambourine, using his lyrics to form a spell that he blasted at the door.

Nothing. Not even the bard’s best power ballad would open it.